


Trying & Promises

by betheflame



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Powers, Angst and Feels, Bulimia, Eating Disorders, Established Relationship, F/M, Female Tony Stark, Hopeful Ending, Hurt Tony Stark, Hurt/Comfort, Infertility, Protective Steve Rogers, Tony Stark Needs a Hug
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-22
Updated: 2020-12-22
Packaged: 2021-03-10 19:35:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,020
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28242477
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/betheflame/pseuds/betheflame
Summary: Steve Rogers *loves* his wife. The only one who doubts that is her.Or, when Toni gets tired of fighting the lies her brain tells and decides to do something about them.
Relationships: Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
Comments: 14
Kudos: 144
Collections: Stony's Sad Secret Santa





	Trying & Promises

**Author's Note:**

  * For [treesramblings](https://archiveofourown.org/users/treesramblings/gifts).



> Thanks to my thorough and gracious beta. 
> 
> Tree, I hope this makes all of your dark and twisty dreams come true.

“God fucking dammit.”

Steve Rogers lived most of his life surrounded by women. Between his wife, her best friend, his best friend, and the staff at his veterinary clinic, Steve was well versed in estrogen. He knew all of their cycles - not only because they told him, but because often it wasn’t hard to tell - and he knew all of their preferred methods for handling it. He was completely comfortable with conversations about birthing processes, toxic masculinity, and how the patriarchy is the worst. He was a vocal advocate that anyone who said they were a woman was one, and he had strong opinions on reproductive autonomy.

He also fucking loved his wife.

Steve gingerly picked up the four negative pregnancy tests from the bathroom counter, and suddenly the obscure text he’d gotten earlier about a spontaneous long run she felt like taking made sense.

He’d met Antonia Stark when he was two years into his veterinary degree at the University of Pennsylvania. She was a visiting scholar in the engineering department, and he’d stumbled into her temporary office accidentally.

_“Who the living fuck are you, Dorito Boy, and why are you asleep in my shit?”_

_Steve startled awake and blinked his eyes, which were crusty with sleep. “Steve Rogers, and I’m sorry, I swore this was an empty carrel.”_

_The woman, who appeared so tiny that he could probably pick her up with one arm (and yet he knew she’d scratch at him like a feral cat if he tried), raised one eyebrow and glanced at the desk. He blanched. If he’d taken six seconds to look before face-planting on the sofa, he would have seen that this wasn’t one of the first-come first-serve offices that grad students could reserve at the library. It was, instead, someone’s actual office._

_“I am so sorry, ma’am -”_

_“Fuck you with your ma’am. I’m 23.”_

_“I apologize for having manners,” Steve retorted. “Ms -”_

_“Dr. Stark.”_

_“Got it.” He scratched the sleep out of his hair and got up. “I have my anatomy comps in two days, and I can barely tell what planet I’m on, much less anything else. I’m sorry. I really am.”_

_“How did you get in here, anyway?” Dr. Stark asked._

_“It was unlocked.”_

_The woman swore to herself. “Jan is going to be so… that’s the sixth time this week. I have... “ She seemed to remember he was in her presence and stuck out her hand. “Toni Stark, Engineering.”_

_That name sounded so familiar to Steve, but he couldn't place it. “Steve Rogers, Veterinary Medicine.”_

_“I was the idiot who left my office with massively proprietary information unlocked, and you look like someone hit you upside the head with insomnia, so let’s call it even. Pancakes?”_

_Was he that tired, or was she conversational whiplash?_

_“I’m sorry?”_

_“It’s 4 AM,” Toni replied. “I’m hungry. I was coming here to grab a book and then I was going to head to Peg’s Diner to get pancakes.”_

_Steve blanched. “Sorry, I can’t go to Peg’s. But if you’re open to Green Street, the pancakes are on me.”_

_“Can’t go to Peg’s because you were once given food poisoning or…” Toni trailed off, clearly expecting an explanation._

_“Peggy’s my ex,” Steve muttered._

_“Well, you know how to pick ‘em,” Toni said with a slow blink. “She’s gorgeous.”_

_“She’s vicious.”_

_“She’s your ex. But Green Street it is, and once we get there, you have the option to tell me what pet I can get that will be around wires and not chew them, or to tell me how you got the infamously lady-dating-only bisexual diner owner to give you the time of day — but I’m going to guess those shoulders had something to do with it.”_

_“I changed her tire.” Steve shrugged and got up off the sofa. He cracked his back in three places as he did and mentally added “see chiropractor” to his to-do list. “Nothing shocking.”_

_“Yeah, I don’t believe you,” Toni replied. “It’s okay. Their boysenberry sauce is a truth serum. I’ll get it out of you.”_

And she had. That was ten years and six months ago, and Steve hadn’t doubted she was the right one for him for a minute since then. They bickered fiercely, and their friends often referred to them as a powder keg about to explode, but he loved her beyond all reasonable measures, and he knew the feeling was mutual.

It was twenty minutes into their first breakfast when Steve connected the dots between the woman in front of him and the Toni Stark he’d seen on magazine covers for most of his life. He tried to square the circle - the perfectly poised, always glamorous daughter of the four-term Governor of New York and two-term President of the United States, and the woman in front of him, who probably hadn’t showered in a day or more, whose hair was tied up above her head with something that looked like a combo zip-tie and leftover knitting yarn, and who had biceps that made it look like she might be able to lift him.

He’d learned quickly that she’d never learned to square the circle either. That both Toni’s were her, but she was comfortable with neither.

Just like he’d learned all the tricks she had for hiding her purging.

Steve pulled out his phone to text her back, letting her know that he was home, and then he searched the bathroom and their bedroom for extra toothbrushes or hidden bottles of mouthwash. Their home in the Hudson Valley wasn’t large, by any stretch, but it was old. They’d bought and restored an old farm house so Steve could run his large animal practice from the comfort of his own land. Old meant nooks and crannies. Old meant hiding spots.

After his brief search, he found six travel bottles of Listerine, nine extra toothbrush/toothpaste combinations, and three boxes of laxatives.

He collapsed on the couch and let himself cry. Toni was desperate to get pregnant, and they both knew her years and years of bulimia were not helping matters - especially because she only occasionally acknowledged she had it. She refused to entertain adoption, and Steve knew it was because her parents had put enormous pressure on her to have a ‘natural Stark’ as much as any other pressures she placed upon herself.

He was just drying his tears when Toni burst through the door. She was breathing heavily, and she plastered a big smile on her face when she saw him. “Hi, baby. What do you want for dinner? I could order Thai. How do you feel about Thai? I could really go for some spring rolls right now.”

“Toni, stop.”

“Or maybe pad thai? Or that thing with the crunchy noodles and the red chillies? Or was that from the Fillipino place? They’re on the same block downtown and so-”

“Antonia.”

She stopped and glared at him. “I asked what you want for dinner. That tone tells me you think there’s another conversation on the table.”

“I found the tests.”

“Ah, we are not talking about that at this time,” she said as she moved away from him. “We are talking about dinner. If you don’t give me input soon, I’m going to just make a decision. You never like when I do that.”

He heaved himself off the couch and headed towards her. He reached for her to pull her into a hug just as she hit the bottom of the stairs. “Steve, don’t. I’m gross.”

“You’re not,” he said firmly, knowing she wasn’t talking about sweat. “You’re mine and I love you.”

“I can be both gross and yours,” she retorted, still stiff in his arms.

“You’re not gross to me,” Steve said. “You never have been.”

With that, she snapped herself away from him and spun on her heel. She marched up the stairs, but paused on the landing to turn around. “That’s a fucking lie, Rogers. I see how you look at me when I come out of the bathroom, when you kiss me before I get a chance to brush my teeth. This way I live, the only way I know how to live, the only way I know how to not peel my skin off piece by piece, it disgusts you. Let’s stop pretending. I disgust you. And now this broken body, which has never made anyone happy - not me, not Mom, not Dad, not the fucking National Enquirer - can’t even do the only thing it was designed for. You have every right to walk away right now - you married a broken toy, Rogers. I’m defective. Send me back and get a better model. I’m sure Nat and Bucky can recommend someone, or maybe that new nurse you got - what’s her name? Darcy? She’s got great tits and you love tits.”

She started back up the stairs, and he called after her.

“Are you done? Do I get to respond?”

“I’m taking a shower, and then I’m ordering Thai. Text me what you want or forever hold your peace.”

Her voice trailed off as she moved farther away, and he eventually heard the water through the pipes.

Yes, Steve Rogers knew lots about women.

Didn’t mean he could help his wife.

* * *

Toni Stark lived her life by numbers.

She was 101 lbs and 63 inches tall, with a 32D bra, a 20-inch waist, and 34-inch hips. She’d been those exact measurements since she was nineteen years old and her mother had sent her to a surgeon to get those exact measurements.

She had six undergraduate degrees - five of which had been earned without her parents’ knowledge - three master’s, and four PhDs. She spoke sixteen languages. She had one husband, two best friends, and seven other people on the planet whom she trusted.

She vomited 656 grams of food an average of ten times per week.

She’d failed to get pregnant for 145 consecutive months.

Standing in the shower, she allowed the heaving sobs of shame to overtake her. She couldn’t believe how she had spoken to Steve, how much verbal bile had spewed from her. He didn’t need to know any of that - those were the ugly thoughts that her parents always taught her to keep inside. She was Elsa before “ _Let It Go_ ,” not after, and she knew it. She could never let it go, because look what “it” was. It was verbal barb after verbal barb that would destroy her husband, whom she loved to distraction and who loved her back for reasons she could not understand.

She was garbage and always had been.

Toni had no idea how long she stayed in the shower, but she finally stepped out when she was both scrubbed and pruned. She reached for her fluffiest bathrobe and wrapped her hair in a separate towel before heading out of the bathroom and into the bedroom.

Where she shrieked upon finding her best friend sitting on the bed.

Janet Van Dyne was the only person who knew what the Stark household was like because the Van Dyne one had been the same. Janet’s dad had even been her father’s Vice President, and the girls were bonded closer than any DNA link could provide.

“Steve called?”

Janet nodded and patted the bed next to her. Toni flopped and then spun herself so that Janet could brush her hair and put it into a braid of some fashion. Their routines were established and well-worn; being around Janet felt like home.

“He’s worried, Toni, and I can’t blame him.”

“I’m fine,” Toni snapped, and she felt Janet’s hands pause in her hair.

“You’re lying, and I don’t know if it’s to me or yourself,” Janet replied calmly. “I’m not interested in being your therapist - I study ants, not humans - but your husband isn’t an idiot, and you’re treating him like one.”

Toni let that hang in the air for a bit. Her whole being felt tired, wrung out, and her defenses were fried. She had a million thoughts banging around her head, and she wasn’t sure which one would fall out if she opened her mouth. She decided to take a gamble and see.

“I can’t stop.”

_Well, I wasn’t prepared for that to be the lead._

“What part of it can’t you stop?” Janet’s voice was steady as she started brushing Toni’s hair with a brush instead of just her fingers. “The secret pregnancy tests that you take alone so Steve doesn’t even know, and just has to come home to negative results? Or the purging? Are you weighing your vomit again? What, exactly, in the myriad of secrets you’ve decided you have to keep so you can be Howard and Maria’s model child, are you unable to stop?”

“Fuck you, Van Dyne.”

“Not with four vibrators or a peg: I’ve seen you drunk too many times.”

Toni snorted. She waited a few seconds until Janet called for a hair tie, paused until her hair was secure, and spun to face her de-facto sister.

“Any of it,” Toni said, her voice laced with resignation. “I feel like a puzzle, where if you pull the wrong piece first, everything disintegrates.”

Janet was quiet for a moment. “What does disintegration mean?”

Toni couldn’t say the word. The one she’d been threatened with her whole childhood if she stepped a toe out of line.

_“ANTONIA MARIA STARK,” Howard bellowed from the doorway of the garage, where she was putting her car back together after taking it apart. She’d been particularly bored that Saturday. “What did you say to that reporter?”_

_Toni rolled herself out from under the car. She’d been in media training since she was five, and seven years of training meant that she couldn’t fathom she’d said anything wrong. “I’m not sure, Daddy. I followed the script.”_

_“AND YET,” his roar continued as he got closer, “they write that I am pressuring you too hard. Do you believe that? Are you weak like your Aunt Geraldine? Do I need to send you to a home where they can fix you?”_

_“No, Daddy.”_

_“Because I will, Antonia. I will institutionalize you before I allow you to bring shame on this family. You are a STARK, and we are MADE OF IRON. If you can’t get that through your thick Carbonell skull, I’ll find someone who can force it in.”_

“Howard is dead, babe,” Janet whispered.

“He’s not though,” Toni whispered back and felt a tear drip down her cheek. Where the hell did that come from?

“If he’s still alive in your head, then that’s your choice,” Janet replied. “Because I watched that motherfucker go into the crematorium myself. You may forget, but we got very, very drunk and Steve, Nat, Bucky, and Pepper all joined us as we went through his prized wine collection.”

“Bucky got so drunk on rosé,” Toni said with a ghost of a smile. “I didn’t know someone who scowled that much could get giggly on girly wine.”

“Rosé is a perfectly respectable wine, you fucking whiskey snob,” Janet retorted.

“Better a whiskey snob than someone who drinks boxed wine,” Toni snapped back.

“Well that was just uncalled for,” Janet said with a smile. This was another one of their routines: Toni being an alcohol elitist and Janet drinking Two Buck Chuck from Trader Joe’s. Janet held out her arms, and Toni curled herself into Janet.

“I can’t make him quiet,” Toni whispered into Janet’s arm, her voice muffled.

“Then we find someone who can help,” Janet replied as she kissed the top of Toni’s head. “Because something’s gotta give, babe. You’re not an idiot. I know you know what you’re doing. If your brain can’t let your body keep food in it, then your uterus is not going to be particularly hospitable.”

“I just keep hoping for a miracle,” Toni replied.

Janet forced her up so they made eye contact. “Why? What have you done to deserve one? The power is entirely in your hands, Toni, and most miracles require a little leg work.”

“I’m too tired,” Toni said.

“Here’s the good news, then,” Janet said. “I’m not tired of fighting for you. Nat, Bucky, Pepper, Bruce, that new girl at the clinic who needs to learn to cover her cleavage a little -”

“Darcy.”

“Thank you. I mean, I love a good rack, but we gotta keep some things profesh, you get me? Anyway, she seems to like you a lot, and I think she’s got spunk. Sharon’s a bitch -”

“My god, when are you going to let it go?” Toni sighed. “She turned you down for a second date. She didn’t murder your puppy.”

“I am a catch, Stark, and I don’t like women who don’t know a good thing when it’s in front of them,” Janet said primly, and even in the fog of her pain, Toni could see that Janet was legitimately still hurt by Sharon’s rejection.

“Fuck, I’m sorry, J. I thought we were doing a bit.”

Janet waved her hand dismissively. “My point being, even though you pretend you don’t, you have a few folks who are at least fond of you, if not outright devoted. Peter, I’m fairly sure, would actually walk through fire for you if MJ didn’t do it first, and we haven’t even gotten to Steve.”

“I don’t deserve him,” Toni said.

“Nope, I reject that,” Janet said. “Fuck deserve. You made vows, and you both work to keep them. Are you being particularly self-destructive? Yeah. Do you need to cut that out? Absolutely. Is Steve perfect? God no. He’s a little shit who can’t remember to clean the dishes properly and has been driving you nuts with that for years. He’s never walked away from a fight, and you and I both know he’s lost patients because of it. Fuck deserve: you guys work, and you love each other, and you’ll keep loving each other, and that’s what matters.”

Toni pursed her lips. “If I go get help, I feel like Howard wins.”

Janet nodded, a thoughtful expression on her face. “I don’t think he does, actually. I see why you say that. But he actually wins if you believe him. The biggest ‘fuck you’ you could give to Howard and Maria would be to live by your own standards instead of theirs.”

Like an algorithm that finally ran correctly, Toni’s brain slid into alignment. She had never thought of it that way before, but Janet was right.

_Holy fuck, Janet was right._

“You’re right,” Toni said. She could hear the revelation in her own voice. “You’re absolutely fucking right.”

“I usually am,” Janet replied, “but I’m particularly happy to be so right now.”

Toni slugged Janet affectionately on the shoulder, and Janet pulled her into a hug. “You ready to control your brain instead of letting it control you?” When Toni nodded, Janet asked if she was ready to go downstairs and see Steve.

Over chips, salsa, and guacamole, the three of them laid out a plan. Steve called nutritionists and social workers, therapists and facilities, and they gathered all the data they needed to figure out how best to help Toni rewrite her mental processes and overcome the patterns her body had long established. Janet worked with a few of Toni’s co-workers to make sure Toni could take some time off and none of their investors would be any the wiser. Toni listened and contributed, offered up some boundaries she felt she needed - no, she didn’t want to go to a camp just for learning how to eat again; yes, she did want regular therapy plus a nutritionist.

“Hey,” Steve said during a lull in the conversation. Toni brought her gaze to his. “Whatever it takes, baby, I’m in. Just please, I beg you, try to let me in a little. You can’t scare me. I’m not running away. Just… a little. Try, please?”

Toni nodded. She got up from her chair and settled herself in his lap. “I’ll try. I promise.”

* * *

_Two Years Later_

“Bad day?”

Steve happened upon Toni in the bathroom, where she was staring at the toilet like it was her mortal enemy.

And in a lot of ways, it was.

“Bad day,” she affirmed. She’d done an interview with Vanity Fair about some philanthropic work she was involved in, and the photographer had been brutal. Her hips didn’t fit the outfit they picked out, even though her PA had told them her measurements, and everyone was grumpy at her because she didn’t look like the busty pixie they’d been expecting.

She was healthier than she’d ever been and was still a failure.

“What do you want to do that doesn’t involve food?” Steve’s question grounded her.

“Can we go adopt a dog?”

If Steve was shocked by her question, he didn’t show it. “Sure, let’s go adopt a dog.”

* * *

_Six Months Later_

“Dr. Stark, I am so sorry, but I don’t believe you are a candidate for in-vitro.”

Steve watched Toni crumble in on herself and was oddly proud. A few years ago, she would have fluffed this off with a sarcastic comment and then spent four days binging and purging as a punishment to herself for not being perfect. Now, she let her tears flow as she reached for his hand.

“I suspected as much,” Toni said, her voice barely above a whisper.

“Thanks, Dr. Mahani,” Steve said. “I think we’ll sit with this info for a little while, but thank you for not beating around the bush. Can we have a few minutes? We’ll leave soon, I promise, just a few minutes?”

The fertility specialist nodded and left the room. Toni didn’t move, so Steve moved to her. He gathered her in his arms and settled himself back in the chair he’d been sitting in. “Can you tell me what you’re thinking?”

“Many, many things,” she said softly. “That I did this to myself, and I’d make a terrible mother anyway. That we never have to worry about condoms again. That you deserve a biological child. That I love you so much because I know you’re going to scoff at that. That I’m so relieved I won’t have to be stuck with so many needles. Lots of things.”

“You’re already a wonderful mothering presence to Mikayla, Brittany, and Jackson,” he replied, naming Pepper’s daughter and Nat and Bucky’s twins. “So that theory is garbage. I’m not upset about the condoms either, and I wasn’t looking forward to sticking you with so many needles, so I’m with you there.”

Toni was quiet, so he barreled on.

“I don’t care about a biological child. I just want to be a dad and parent with you. I want to raise children with you, if you want to raise children with me -”

“I do.”

“Then let’s go home, maybe take a nap, and then call the adoption agency.”

“Are you sure?”

“Positive,” Steve affirmed and kissed the top of her head. He felt some of the tension bleed out of her. One of the many things he’d learned in therapy was that the only person who ever kissed the top of her head before Janet was her favorite nanny. It was one of the ways she knew she was loved and safe, so he made a point to do it as often as possible.

“Okay, but pie first.”

“Obviously,” Steve replied. “We are two blocks from Lulu’s and not ordering peanut butter pie from Lulu’s when one is near is actually rude.”

“You hate being rude.” Toni sniffed a bit and extricated herself from Steve’s lap. She threw on her jacket and grabbed her purse. “We’re not far from Ferret’s Festive Fun either. Let’s stop and get a few treats for Aldie.”

Steve smiled. Toni spoiled their adopted beagle/corgi mix, but Alderon Spacemaster III had been essential in Toni’s continued healing, and Steve could never begrudge her devotion to the dog. “Of course. Pie for Steve and Toni, treats for Aldie.”

“I love you,” Toni said in reply.

“For as long as we both shall live,” Steve replied, and Toni grinned.


End file.
